Management of acceptable use of computing facilities in the public library: avoiding a panoptic gaze?

Panopticism is concerned with the idea that in particular institutions and situations it is possible for people to be constantly observed, and be aware of same. Foucault adapted Jeremy Bentham’s Panopticon prison model, where all prisoners could be viewed from one central location of a circular structure without ever knowing if they were actually being viewed at any point. The notion here is that behaviour may adapt in the knowledge that the behaviour could be being observed. Foucault’s work also observed how power exists in a panoptic environment. It must be started that Foucault did not deem power to be necessarily oppressive; it is seen as a productive force circulating through society (Haider & Bawden, 2007) and he views power and knowledge as being interdependent of one another.